What a surprise! Seeing flowers as the first site to greet the day certainly brings a smile! How can one help smiling when beholding the beauty of flowers? They are like candy for the eye, a visual assortment of confetti in every shape and color imaginable.

Simple petal shapes can add interest and help to balance and fill space. When placed on a vine, they can suggest movement and lead the eye to various parts of a design as above.

The flowers can be realistic looking with needle painting

When using techniques such as needle painting with silk floss, flowers can take on a very realistic appearance, as if they were recently picked from the garden.

Flowers used to accent a design motif in Ecclesiastical Embroidery

Want to accent or frame a design? Flowers may be the key. Using symmetry and balance, the roses and carnations help the eye focus on the gold cross.

Rose and Cross Ecclesiastical Embroidery Design

Tiny rosebuds are used to frame this little design. These simplistic elements are perfectly balanced.

Lilies Used in Ecclesiastical Embroidery Designs

Looking for a design that is a little more bold? How about lilies?

French Ecclesiastical Embroidery Designs and vestments

Used in both large and small sizes, lilies are often seen in Ecclesiastical Embroidery designs.

Delicate lilies for Ecclesiastical Design

Sometimes they are realistic; while at other times the lilies are stylized.

Ecclesiastical Lily design by John D. Sedding, Architect

Famous Designers have used lilies as an element for their work, such as this design by a well known Architect and Author from the late 1800’s, John D. Sedding of the United Kingdom.

Stylized Ecclesiastical Floral Embroidery in Vivid colors

Whether stitched in vivid colors or

Whitework Ecclesiastical Embroidery Design

intended for whitework, flowers are an important design element in Ecclesiastical Sewing and Ecclesiastical Embroidery.

Needle Painted Cope Hood from Haehn Museum

While I love lilies, nothing says beauty like a rose, and so, in honor of St. Valentine’s Day, here is a gift of roses. This beautiful piece of Ecclesiastical Embroidery has to be one of my favorites. It is part of the Rose set of vestments from the Haehn Museum.

Rose Orphrey from the Rose Vestment Set at Haehn Museum

Worked in the late 1800’s on silk satin, the needle painting on this piece is nothing short of exquisite. The color shading on the roses is worked to perfection. The colors seem to blend effortlessly from one into the next, creating the perfect balance of light and shadow, and vivid color.

Thank you for joining me on this special Holiday, as we take a walk through the gardens of sacristies and Ecclesiastical workrooms, and enjoy the variety of flowers therein. So how about you? Do you have a favorite floral motif or design for Ecclesiastical Embroidery?